[504] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
Protesting Fun?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Richard J. Barbalace)
Thu May 3 15:25:07 2001
Message-Id: <200105031924.PAA01597@starbase.mit.edu>
To: mit-talk@MIT.EDU
Date: Thu, 03 May 2001 15:24:35 -0400
From: "Richard J. Barbalace" <rjbarbal@MIT.EDU>
I've dropped by Harvard Yard a couple times in the past week to see
how their protest is going (most recently yesterday while eating free
Ben&Jerry's). I've been struck by two things about their living
wage campaign:
1) These student protestors have an enormous amount of support from
not just students, but also faculty, staff, parents, city
councillors, national organizations, news media, etc.
2) They think protesting is fun.
I keep being surprised most by the second point. Even though it's
been a lot of work, frustration, and loss of studying, they actually
seem to enjoy protesting. That's something I think just doesn't
happen at MIT. Here students hate protesting; they only protest when
the administration does something truly egregious, and still consider
it a chore and hope to get back to problem sets as quickly as
possible.
I wonder if MIT student protests and actions would be more effective
if people enjoyed them.... Or if even then, and with as much support
from faculty and others as the living wage protestors have, student
activism would be doomed due to the MIT Administration being as
asininely obstinate as the Harvard Administration.
Anyway, there's an interesting article in the Globe today about the
Harvard protestors:
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/123/nation/A_life_of_its_own+.shtml
In a way, it sounds like a great hack.
+ Richard
